Cent Couronnes
by Tuna Salad Sonnet
Summary: -100 DRABBLES- Parents: It's a lie every quasi-father figure has to deal with at some point. Xigbar&Demyx&Dug of Up!
1. Years

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Second visit to Port Royal.  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_010 - Years

* * *

**Dim As An Ember**

It's strange to see him here, without his black leather skin and gloves. Today he is another man, all white collared shirt, crisp and ironed. Perfectly ordinary they are, a girl in a wispy sundress and (somewhat battered) straw beach hat and her (much) older brother or guardian, set for a walk on the beach.

She decides that this is the right place to start, slips her hand into his. "Now remember," he says, "if you start to feel sick, tell me and we'll go home."

Part of her wants to say, _but this _is_ home_, but the rest of her remembers who she is and nods.

They start walking down the beach, water sliding over their bare feet and getting sand stuck to the bottom of his pants. In the sky, the sun pauses then travels backs up its path, so far back that it is suddenly nighttime. She closes her eyes as the sun and the moon's backward trade-off starts to climb to dizzying speeds. She concentrates on the sound and the feel of the waves across the sand, which remains oddly constant as years spin away under his will.

She feels an odd prickling in her skin, and knows that he has activated the part of his powers that allow them to go unseen by the people of this time. Nine years previous. Before the Heartless.

She opens her eyes and looks up at him. She's glad that he's already spotted her show-and-tell. The people they now share the beach with.

The sunset paints his hair the same deep gold and their smiles are made all the more similar by the beards. The extra glint of the rings in his ears does not change the shared aura of sophistication. The dramatically different colours of their eyes don't change the wisdom they absorb and emanate. Eyes that have seen too much.

_Her_ mirror image is skewed a little more heavily, due to the age difference and the deep red of the hair. The little Princess's dress is lilac and her hat far newer, but this is her Other Side. The smile is less shy, but hers. Still trusting, still listening. The eyes seem to be a little more purple, but they are the same, full of love for this man, _her_ guardian. Her father.

Suddenly the Princess spots a crab and runs to catch it, dragging her father along by the arm. He laughs and jogs off over the sand with her. The Nobodies stay behind and watch as the Princess and King of Radiant Garden, crouch near the tide pools and try to find their crustaceous friend. Eventually though, she is pointing tiny fingers at the inhabitants of the pools and he pins tiny labels to them for her that she'll struggle to remember, words like "anenemonome" and "stahfish".

The phantoms watch at a distance, peering into a moment they know will never happen again.

"Let's come here again, Naminé", he says, and squeezes her hand.


	2. Sunrise

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - World That Never Was, Hall of Empty Melodies (?)  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_031 - Sunrise

* * *

**Keyblades are a Girl's Best Friend**

He has seen her wear everything, he thinks. He has seen her wear a giant poofy princess gown with matching cardboard crown (the jewels are plastic and stuck on with hot glue) in a play when they were eleven. He has seen her wear a long scarf her grandmother knitted her during the rare island winters. Purple, yellow, and black stripes with white tassels, just the way she likes.

He has seen her in a lavender skort and twin tank tops that let her run across white sands. He has seen her in a pink zippered dress and white undershirt, though this outfit had confused him.

"I thought you didn't like wearing pink," he had said to her in the Nobody castle.

She frowned down at the dress, apparently not liking to think about it too much. "I _was_ going to buy it in purple, but Ashe bought the last one."

He has even seen photos of her in the fluttery lilac dress she wore to the homecoming he and Riku missed. (She went alone.)

But she has never been more beautiful than when she has darkness and dirt smeared across her cheeks, slinging her new Oathmaker over her shoulders. The rising sun glints off her metal arm guards and the zipper on her jacket. It turns her ponytail a bright red as she looks thoughtfully over the World they are exploring, a smile playing on her face. This is fun for her.

She turns and notices him watching her. She tilts her head, letting the stars hanging from her ears jingle. "What's up?" she asks.

He shakes his head, never taking his eyes off her. "Just watching the sunrise. Pretty, huh?"


	3. How?

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Roxas Prologue.  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_081 - How?

* * *

**Paper Craft**

"Ugh, I hate this part."

"What part?" the girl leaned over to look at the paper crane in his hand.

"The 'folding the head' part. I always end up squashing it. Or ripping the thing's neck off."

Naminé rolled her eyes. "Do you make sure to _crease_ the paper first?"

"...Crease?"

"Yeah, you have to make crease lines so the fold will follow your guidelines, kinda. I didn't think it was _possible_ to do origami without knowing anything about crease lines."

He frowns at her for a long while than gives the headless crane to her. "Screw it, I'll find something else to fold, O Queen of Paper Cuts."

She rolls her eyes again and starts making the crease lines necessary for the inward fold needed for the head. A minute or so later she is holding crane #672 and Roxas nudges her with his elbow. She turns to him, ready to be annoyed with him like the cross-legged children they are, but he is smiling widely and she can't help but think that he needs to do that more often.

"Pick a colour?" he asks mischievously, brandishing his brand new cootie catcher.

She smiles back. "Blue."


	4. Spirit

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ Chain of Memories - Lexaeus boss battle (?)  
_**Warnings: **_Blood and death.  
_**Prompt: **_055 - Spirit

* * *

**Que Que Na-to-ra**

She's not a likely candidate for the new village shaman. But Kekata is getting on in years and he doesn't think his son will be able to handle the duty. They pick her for the red soil on the soles of her feet and her beating-drum heart. The gentle push from Pocahontas doesn't hurt either.

The entire camp has gone to bed, but she stays awake. She throws another bone onto the fire, biting her lip in concentration. This one fizzles oddly and the smoke cloud that rises makes a pale grizzly. She stands, eyes lighting up because finally, something _happened!_

But her beginner's cloud isn't thick enough and after a second, her eyes focus on the shape she can see through it, standing at the edge of camp.

Her heart stops.

He's looking at her differently, and he's holding some giant version of her people's axes. But it's how he walks that she knows something is wrong. It's not the same slow, steady gait. He's hurt, and badly.

She hears the Voice of the Wind whispering as she leaps over her dying fire and through her cloud to reach him. He drops to his knees and she does too, skidding over the dusty ground until she's right in front of him. She's immediately reminded of how huge he his, even hunched over and in pain.

He's bleeding, she thinks, but it's hard to tell exactly through all the black leather. Something got him through the stomach.

Help. Her voice is stuck in her throat and she opens her mouth dumbly.

He lifts her chin, and his hand is huge and rough and soft and cold. _I'm already gone,_ his eyes tell her.

She doesn't remember when she started crying. _...Then why?_

He's silent, just realizing the reason himself. I wanted to see you. He brushes her cheek, watches the tears curiously.

She can't believe she's singing. She was always too shy, even with him. _"Que que na-to-ra, you will understand... Listen with your heart, you will understand._

_"Let it break upon you like a wave upon the sand,"_ her voice cracks like clay as she takes his face in her hands and looks into those blue eyes one last time.

His arms crush her in an embrace and she sobs into his ear, her fingers tangled in short red hair. _"Listen with your heart..."_

The mountain crumbles away from her and she rocks against the ground quietly, arms collapsing in on themselves around empty air. He is gone now.

_I don't understand._

_

* * *

_**AN. **This particular drabble went on to be the basis for "Beating Drum Heart", a Lexaeus centric multi-chaptered fic. :D


	5. Broken

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Second visit to Beast's Castle.  
_**Warnings: **_Language.  
_**Prompt: **_071 - Broken

* * *

**The Aftermath**

The machine whined to a stop before finally crumbling in on itself, a molten metal heap. Thick black smoke spewed from huge holes in the metal hide caused by the... _how_ many explosions had there been?

Xaldin braced himself against the wall and pushed against the overturned desk that pinned him, but it wouldn't budge under his shocked system. "Xigbar?" he shouted, then, (being practical) "Are you alive?"

"Yeah man," Xigbar appeared out of the smoke, wheezing. "Need help?"

The desk turned black, speckled with stars. It was now light enough that Xaldin could push it off of him. He wrenched the goggles off his face, horribly aware of the soot, chemicals, and dust that must cling to them. "Xemnas is going to kill us."

"Xemnas? _Vexen's_ going to kill us! It's _his_ lab!" Xigbar pulled his one customized lens up onto his forehead, the thick black strap extended over his scarred socket.

"Was," Xaldin corrected. Speaking of the other scientists...

"Shit, Lexaeus's bonsaiiiii..." he drifted off as they caught sight of the charred Zexion-high specimen collapse into a pile of ashes.

"I take that back. _Lex_ is going to kill us."

"He'll do worse than that." Xaldin actually gritted his teeth nervously.

"Well... at least we got to see one hell of a fireworks display before we kicked the bucket." Xigbar looks up at him, blinking.

"Yeah..." Xaldin grins, almost sheepishly, if it's possible, white teeth showing through his soot-covered face. "Too bad the rest of them missed it."

A lightbulb goes off and the Freeshooter starts laughing. And he keeps laughing for as long as his lungs will allow in the acrid room. He's almost keeling over when Xaldin clears the air in their vicinity. Xigbar gulps in fresh air and straightens, grinning, eyes watering.

"Dude! _We are fucking awesome._ Nobody but us would have been crazy enough to go through with this."

The Lancer coughs a couple of times before the laughter pulls through. "We're pioneers!"

"Adventurers!"

"Trailblazers!"

They're still laughing in the midst of their chaos when the other four finally open the jammed door.


	6. Where?

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHI - Deep Jungle (?)  
_**Warnings:**_ None.  
_**Prompt:**_ 078 - Where?

* * *

**Ninety-Nine**

Sora nearly had a heart attack the first time he found a Dalmatian puppy.

When Goofy had translated Pongo and Perdita's problem about their missing children being scattered to the different Worlds when theirs had crumbled, he had expected that meant he'd find the puppies hidden in nooks and crannies. A hollow tree in the Lotus Forest, a warm cave near the Hippos' Lagoon. So he kept his eyes open for little places like that while out exploring with Donald and Goofy.

But oh no, Worlds crumbling meant Heartless and Heartless meant huge _jerks_ who could control Heartless and huge jerks who can control Heartless meant mistreatment of ninety-nine adorable puppies.

And mistreatment of puppies meant Sora tapping open a treasure chest to find not a potion or ether but three whining puppies seeing sunlight for the first time in who-knows-how-long.

Sora had run past the catching-up Donald and Goofy with all three in his arms (which was unfortunately easy due to how still they were) back to the Gummi ship and the gym bag full of baby bottles filled with Dalmatian milk Aeris had dropped into his arms before they'd left.

Then he had watched anxiously as Goofy fed the puppies, experience with his own child (a child of, more or less, the same species) making him the expert. He had even let Donald pilot the ship again so he could sit cross-legged on the floor of the cockpit as the Captain of the Knights set the puppies down so they could stretch their legs. They had hobbled over to sniff at their saviour and he had picked them up gently.

At some point in his playtime with them, Sora sniffed (the puppies licked his face to taste the salt) and realized that _this_ was better than anything else he'd found.


	7. Friends

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHI - Atlantica.  
_**Warnings:**_ None.  
_**Prompt:**_ 021 - Friends

* * *

**Light Wash**

"Thanks again for the clothes, Sora. I never thought I'd be a… representative for my whole world!" The mermaid-turned-human reigned in her red hair and started to pile it on top of her head.

"No problem, Ariel!" he replied cheerfully. He handed her the hair elastic she needed. He watched as she somehow twisted that one piece of plastic around and around in a way that held everything together. "How do you do that?" he couldn't help asking.

She laughed as they continued up the road, towards the castle where the peace summit was being held. "I have six older sisters, Sora. It's a girl thing.

"Oh, that reminds me. Are you sure you don't mind that I dragged you away from your friends to shop? I know they really mean a lot to you-"

"Ariel, you're my friend too! Besides, you couldn't spend a week here in that big dress. It's been way too hot these days."

She laughed. "You can say that again. Do you think King Mickey will mind if I drink a whole swimming pool when we get back?"

Their conversation was interrupted when a man across the street wolf whistled at the princess in the pale blues jeans. Sora froze, then shook his fist at the man, feeling his face turn red (in embarrassment or anger, he wasn't sure which). "H-Hey! She's taken you know!"

Ariel giggled and took his hand. "C'mon Sora. We're going to be late!"


	8. Teammates

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - 3rd visit to Hollow Bastion.  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_026 - Teammates

* * *

**Jubilee**

There are far more heartless than they were expecting, and the kid needs help. "Sora!" he shouts as he jumps down onto the Ravine Path. He sets to work, swings his sword and cleaves the darkness into pieces.

The King's men are with him too, as always. The inseparable three. It always felt strange to say one name without the other two rolling off your tongue. _Sora Donald Goofy._ And though the trio usually run together in their bright colours, it is the magician that speaks to him through battle that day.

The green sprouts of a Cura glow over his head, and somewhere at the back of his mind, there is the memory of grass-stain days with Leon (then Squall) and... and Zack.

Then not two seconds later, the duck is floating around Sora, and he uses fireworks to burn back the darkness. The smell of the cotton candy blue smoke flakes back more years and he is taken back to Radiant Garden, sitting on roof tiles with all the other neighbourhood kids. The Apprentices never disappoint at the festivals.

The fireworks stop. That night is over and he is back in the present.

Radiant Garden. That was what he was fighting for.

And ironically, it was Donald Duck who had reminded him.


	9. Heart

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers: **_KHII - Second visit to Port Royal  
_**Warnings: **_Minor violence.  
_**Prompt: **_047 - Heart

* * *

**Good Night and Good Luck**

Lights burst painfully across his eyes as the punch cracked his rib cage, bouncing down and ricocheting off his insides like a pinball. He staggered and she shouted.

"It hurts, doesn't it?" There was a cry in her voice, somewhere deep down. He could hear her going in for another blow.

"Tifa, **stop.**" He felt the clock wind down at his command, and caught her fist point-blank.

Her eyes widened as the whole night twisted to his power, rain frozen in shining curtains. She pushed away from the blue of his gaze and paced. Time started again. Her hands fisted in her hair, in frustration.

She turned back after a couple of deep breaths, but the anger wasn't gone. "I'm sorry. You're hurt."

Funny how she knew that. "It's...alright."

"Why did you lie?" she asked the wet pavement. "Why didn't you just tell me?"

"It wasn't supposed to go so far that I'd have to make the choice between truth and lies. It was supposed to be one chance meeting. But-"

"But what? You were curious about me, is that it?"

A smile twitched at the corners of his mouth. "I'm curious about a lot of women I meet, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't about you. I've made it easy to forget. The second meeting – that was fate."

She looked up at him then. "Fate. You really do believe in it?"

"Hnh," he grunted, clutching at his chest as pain started to radiate from his ribs outward. "The only thing I lied about was my name and the… condition of my co-workers and me."

He wondered if he accidentally made a time skip, because when he next opened his eyes he was standing in a sheltered alleyway. He felt his teeth rattle against glass as potion and something alcoholic slid down his throat.

"Luxord." She tried his name, his true name for the first time, and he wondered if it was the _x_ of brotherhood or the sound of her voice softening that seared him. Her cool fingertips brushed through his hair hesitantly. "You really think I can find him, then?"

"Of course." He felt the bricks under his back as he straightened his knees. His bones demanded that he still lean on something.

"You think I can find him by myself?" she asked quietly, eyes drifting down down.

He could see the strategy she was using. He took her cheek in gloved fingers. "You'll have to. Good night," he kissed her eyelids, "good luck," he kissed her cheek. He let the darkness climb up the wall, was ready to lean back into the portal, let his soul crack later when he was far away. "And good-"

She kissed him hard, grabbed his jacket and pulled him away from the dark door. He immediately noticed how desperate it was, fought to free himself from it, but their foreheads were stuck together and he couldn't disappear back into time. She breathed against his lips, "Don't say goodbye. I'm _sick_ of people saying goodbye."

"Tifa." He stumbled in a mental fog, clutching for the words he wielded so well (usually). "I can't go with you."

"Do you love me?"

"…I can't. You know I can't."

"_Try._"

She cupped his face in her hands and kissed him again. This time he tasted possibility (probability?) on her lips and he shattered somewhere inside. He brought her closer, wrapped his arms around her, breathed against her

and kissed back.


	10. Diamond

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Second visit to Port Royal.  
_**Warnings:**_ Implied sexual abuse.  
_**Prompt:**_ 048 - Diamond

* * *

**Here's Looking at You, Kid**

She sits in a chair next to his bed in the Infirmary of Damage Done. She's uncomfortable because she knows that Vexen and Zexion are talking behind the glass and watching them.

She finishes the inside reverse fold needed for the head and looks up at him with those worried blue eyes.

"Eight hundred and twenty two, love," he says. Keeping count is his specialty.

She puts the crane in the wicker basket she brought down from her room. All its sisters rest there, in matching copies of their mistress's white dress. The angles and lines are perfect, pressed into the paper by her anxious fingers.

"Can you please tell me what you were fighting about?" she asks again.

_Marluxia is fast, but timing is his specialty too. The swing of the scythe is like the swing of a grandfather's pendulum. It is almost too easy._

_Until the pendulum stops mid-swing and goes backwards, catching him in the shoulder blade and dragging him forward, until the Assassin can whisper in his ear._

_It's just intimidation he's lying no one could do such a thing to her, his mind reels and screams at him in exactly 2.3 seconds._

_Marluxia's never been a very creative liar, his mind retorts in another 1.1 seconds._

_Gold light slips through the black leather sleeves and rises up off his arms. Little triangles of hard gold light. Little shards shifting and changing in time._

_And then he's clutching the control, and he wants to let go more than anything. It isn't logical, part of him thinks. He doesn't have a heart, he can't possibly be_ this _upset._

_Someone is restraining him because when he moves forward, toward the Assassin's horrified face, his boots slide backward and his knees hit the ground._ "I'll kill you if you touch her again! If you even think of coming near her again - I'll _kill_ you!"

_Nobody was allowed to hurt her like that. Not while he was around._

_The Assassin's hourglass had been turned over._

She is crying.

His head still buzzed from his close encounter with the time stream and his shoulder still ached from his close encounter with the Assassin's scythe. He had told her once, 'no boys until you're married or over thirty'. And Marluxia… _Marluxia…_

"I was trying to protect you, Naminé. Although we can both see how well that went."

She takes a deep breath. Sobbing would alert the two watching.

He looks toward the basket at the foot of his bed. One hundred and seventy-eight more would make one thousand.

"Are you trying to save my soul?"

She sniffs and wipes an eye with her wrist and smiles. "Hm."


	11. Drink

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Second visit to Port Royal.  
_**Warnings: **_Language and alcohol.  
_**Prompt: **_060 - Drink

* * *

**Beta Potion #552**

"I still say you broke him."

Larxene frowned, perched up on the counter. "I have _experience_ in that area, Xigbar. Luxord isn't broken. But whatever caused this," she gestured to the man passed out on the kitchen table, "can't be because of our drinking contest."

The man prodded the blond in the head once. Of course there was no response. "Hm. I'm guessing you're right. Brit can take his liquor. What was the poison this time around?"

"Drinker's choice," Larxene shrugged. "I went with Kahlúa."

"Ha! Vexen's gonna be upset. No telling when we'll find a bottle of that stuff again."

A smile peeled back the woman's lips at the mental image of an annoyed Vexen for a moment. "I'm not sure what Luxord went with, now that I think about it."

Xigbar reached over the stone cold contestant and picked up the green bottle. Some sort of wine, it looked like. He wasn't able to tell what brand exactly because… "Label's ripped off. Huh. Weird."

"_What's_ weird?" Larxene was obviously very tired of the conversation by now.

"Vexen's a stickler for keeping the cupboards organized. He _makes_ a label if the bottle doesn't have one." The man spun the bottle around in his hands for a second, looking for the blue plastic of the Chilly Academic's label-maker. "Wait. …Oh, _shit._"

Xigbar ran to one of the cupboards near the sink and started digging, but Larxene ignored him. "Hear that, Luxord? Shit! You'll be up-and-at-'em in no time!"

She jumped slightly when the one conscious man in the room set a microscope, eye-dropper, and glass slides on the counter beside her. He sucked some of the liquid out of the nearly empty bottle into the eye-dropper and started preparing a slide faster than any of the other scientists would've believed.

Larxene was unimpressed. "We have a _microscope_ in the kitchen, but no good salt shakers. What in the world-"

"Shit shit _shit!_" Xigbar said as he focused the lens, obviously used to any optical adjustments he had had to make since loosing his right eye.

"I'm guessing Luxord didn't drink wine then?"

"It was a potion I was making. Supposed to enhance my powers over space. Who knows what it's doing to Luxord's system," Xigbar said all of this mostly to himself, but turned to Larxene, suddenly. "Larxene, you have to wake him up."

"That's what I've been trying to do for the past twenty minutes," the woman pouted.

"I don't know, do something loud. Do something bitchy!"

Larxene glared at her superior by several years, mouth set in one very not-pleased line.

The slap exploded in the small kitchen, thunder bouncing off every white surface again and again. Silence.

Then, "**OW.**"

The two Nobodies were distracted from their glaring contest (though Xigbar had had no chance of winning, what with only one eye and cradling a scarred cheek in one hand) by a clicking sound. They turned towards Luxord, who had jumped awake, sitting perfectly upright in his chair.

His pupils had been replaced with two glowing gold disks and he was making a constant rhythmic clicking with his tongue. Eerily, he blinked occasionally, but made no other impression of having any idea what had happened.

His two compatriots leaned forward over the table, taking this in.

"_You turned Luxord into a clock._"

"…Shit."


	12. Insides

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ If you know who/what Lexaeus and Zexion are, you should be good.  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_004 - Insides

* * *

**Bones**

His bones are made of iron struts and ball bearings, holding up the frame of a mountain.

But just because he is built like a rock doesn't mean his head is full of them. The new ones always give him those looks of astonishment when some complicated algorithm rolls of his tongue like a nursery rhyme. It always manages to get under his skin like rust.

---

_His_ bones crack and crease and tear under pressure like paper. That's why he sticks by him.

I'm fine, he always insists, even as the magic that flows from his marrow loses strength. I'm fine, he says, as the spine of his weapon comes closer to snapping as they move on.

He's always sure to carry lots of ethers. And the silent smile from underneath the other's bangs is always thanks enough.

---

Her rib cage is made of curved bows of strong wood. Maybe the creamy warm browns of bird's eye maple. It guards a healthy heart that beats like a drum to a constant rhythm.

She tries to understand how a skeleton can live on with only a soul to keep it going. (Deep down, he doesn't understand either.) He doesn't much care when he has to start from the very beginning. He ends up repeating himself, quietly, that _yes_, not only are there other _Worlds_, there are other _Realms_ and he is of neither Light nor Dark.

He does care when he has to take her hand and press it against his chest so she can feel the absence of a heartbeat.

She spreads out her fingers like she is painting her handprint on the heart not there and smiles, humming the song of her secret place. They sit in silence and he can feel her heart beat through her palm like a rabbit thumping.

He's glad she understands.


	13. Death

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Second visit to the Land of Dragons  
_**Warnings: **_Death.  
_**Prompt: **_030 - Death

* * *

**Sorridere di Nuovo**

"Xigbar?"

"Mm?" the man responded, putting the potted plant back down on the desk.

"When was the last time you slept?"

He turned to the filmy vision of Xaldin standing over him. "When did you die?"

"About a week ago," he answered, putting his hands into the pockets of his lab coat.

"Then about a week ago."

Xaldin sighed and rubbed the bridge between his pointy eyebrows, just like Xigbar knew he would. "Insomnia. I'm guessing post traumatic stress."

"Post traumatic stress? Dude, I can't get trauma. No heart," Xigbar's boots left trails in the dust of the basement lab. No one had been in the Never Was lab since… well, since they had started construction on Castle Oblivion. And that might as well have been ten years ago.

"You outlived all of your friends and the boy you initiated into the Organization." The illusion's fingers ghosted over a rack of beakers casually as the other walked away from him. "Must've been like losing a son."

"Oh-ho, I see what you're doing," Xigbar grinned stiffly, his hand reaching out and clenching an Erlenmeyer flask. His arm was shaking in the memory of anger. "You're getting under my skin, so I'll get annoyed and try and go to sleep. And then I'll stop hallucinating and seeing you."

Dead-Xaldin narrowed his eyes slightly, looking up. "You mean you _want_ to hallucinate?"

A pause. Xigbar turned slowly. "I miss you, man."

The Freeshooter coughed and looked towards the ceiling, laughing as a cover. "It's too quiet around here."

The phantom shook his head. "Xigbar, I'm disappointed. If it's too quiet, make some noise."

"I-- what do you mean?"

Xaldin spread his arms. "There's no one here to stop you. Blow something up."

The not-phantom looked at him out of his good eye incredulously. "You _are_ a hallucination, right?"

The taller man smiled widely, something that would've been dangerous in just about any other situation. He tilted his head towards a cupboard. "The sodium hydroxide's behind the copper II sulphate."

Xigbar felt his face stretch. He realized later that it was a grin. "I promise I won't have too much fun."

The shadow was still smiling as it flickered into the empty side rooms of the lab. _You better not._


	14. She

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Roxas prologue. The rest is all very vague.  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_085 - She

* * *

**The White Sheep**

Luxord protected her.

Xaldin taught her. (The scientists laughed at him, but Xaldin never laughed when it came to training.)

Larxene cracked her.

Marluxia broke her.

She crumbled with the Replica.

She rebuilt with Riku.

She saw something in DiZ that harkened back to Luxord. But it wasn't hers.

It was Kairi's. She never truly forgave herself for forgetting to tell her as she sank into the sea.

Axel had lost her.

Sora had found her.

And she had found him.

Roxas.


	15. Not Enough

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Second visit to Port Royal.  
_**Warnings: **_Sexual abuse.  
_**Prompt: **_034 - Not Enough

* * *

**Futility**

He knows.

He knows how to control her, and it's not just the vines. He never shuts his mouth for one thing, prints his whispers on her skin. Sometimes she struggles against him, but she's learned that there's no point. Because he's always there now. Even alone in her room, even alone with the Replica, he is there in the soft shy sound of paper, in quiet footsteps.

He is there in the black fingers against the curve of her hips, the weight of his chest against her knees. He is the inky canvas that her fingers scratch against in vain. He is the drowning perfume of _damn roses_ and all-white-teeth-grin.

But the scream that rips across her throat and into his clasped hand is hers. She squeezes her eyes shut and sobs, a tear rolling down her cheek.

And Roxas wakes up.

He sits up in the bed, and brushes his face. He had cried in his sleep, a single tear.

He threw back the covers and portalled into Proof of Existence. Thirteen blue panels met his eyes. (It had always bothered him that Naminé didn't get one.) He spat on the one marked XI.

Any other night and he would've walked through the Eighth Portal, to the Gallery of Masks. But Axel was gone; into the halls of Oblivion. So instead he walked through the Tenth.

Luxord was meditating at the bottom of Havoc's Divide, a technique Xaldin had taught his Neophyte since the earliest days of Organization X. His deck of cards spun through the air, shuffling themselves again and again. The lesser Gamblers scattered as Roxas strode through them, his cloak flapping like a renegade's cape.

The Gambler of Fate's hand shifted as Roxas kneeled across from him. The cards assembled themselves and fell into his hand perfectly, his own army of weapons. The steel eyes opened. "Roxas. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

The boy glared at his knees as his fists tightened against his pyjama pants (some brave knight he was). "Why do I want to protect her?"

A paradoxical smile took over the man's face, a weighty wager showing behind his straight face. "Answer me that, Thirteen, and you'll have won the game we both play."

* * *

**AN. **Companion to "Too Much".


	16. Club

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Second visit to Port Royal.  
_**Warnings: **_Violence/death/gore(?)  
_**Prompt: **_049 - Club

* * *

**I'm Ready for My Close-Up**

The man in the black coat was honestly surprised at the entire lack of odd glances he was receiving. The man being stabbed didn't give him a second glance, and the pirate throwing bombs through windows didn't gawk. Had they been able to see beneath his hood, they would've seen that his eyebrows were perched high on his forehead.

He realized, suddenly, what an interesting life one must lead when you were more surprised by a man who had had a hatchet thrown into his back get up completely unharmed than black creatures with glowing eyes stealing hearts. Well, there you have it.

He picked a particularly rowdy group dancing about with torches and wild grins and trailed them through the smoky streets. They came to a magnificent house behind a thin iron gate. They dashed up to the front door, knocked, and shot a man in the chest. Again, he couldn't help noting, no Heartless? This was going to be more difficult than he thought. The man shook his head, pondering, and went around the back.

He went through a window into the white dining room. Such things were easy when you could turn yourself into a playing card. He stood up, and shook the sensation of two dimensions out of his sleeve. There was the sound of what might have been a chandelier dropping in the other room, and a woman entered from a double door. She stuck a candelabrum between the doorknobs and walked into the room, looking for a weapon. She froze at the sight of him.

His eyebrows shot up again. She only looked back at him, panic in her eyes.

Eventually, he cocked his head at her. Definitely not a maid with that hair and dress. "Hello, poppet."

She caught her breath and said, "I need to negotiate the cessation of these hostilities against Port Royal."

He chuckled before he could do anything else. He started pacing around the table towards her. "Oh, quite the sesquipedalian I have before me. It's rather quaint; how you have surmised that I am more… sophisticated than the other gentlemen you've had the pleasure of meeting."

He clapped for her, the sound somewhat drowned by the door behind them being rammed. "I applaud you, o socialite," he bowed, his arms spread wide, "for you are undoubtedly correct."

Her jaw clenched in frustration. "I _need_ to negotiate-"

He straightened, laughing outright. "I'm disinclined to acquiesce to your request."

One of the branches came off the candelabrum, and the door swung open. The girl spun to face the two pirates (one with a glass eye) behind it and he gave a curt wave as a portal swirled up behind him. "Means 'no'."


	17. Family

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - World That Never Was  
_**Warnings: **_None  
_**Prompt: **_024 - Family

* * *

**scio me nihil scire**

Kairi couldn't tell you a lot about Ansem the Wise.

Really, any parts of their story that they had to explain back on the Islands involving the King of Radiant Garden was left mostly to Riku.

Kairi couldn't tell you anything. She couldn't say that the King's eyes were red. She had never been close enough to see them, after all.

She couldn't tell you that he read books as thick as her arms with hand painted words. She had never seen books like those, much less owned by a man she had seen for all of five minutes.

She couldn't tell you that his face felt rough against her (small) hands when he hadn't shaved for a couple of days. How could she?

She couldn't tell you that she gave him simple answers to questions he asked – she preferred to explain things with her hands. They had never spoken.

She couldn't tell you that she hated dancing in frilly dresses, even when he was supposed to be teaching her, because they _itched_ so much. No, she had learned the simple waltz in gym when she was eight. She remembers how the entire class dreaded the unit so clearly.

She couldn't tell you how she had nearly never forgiven him for discovering her batch of surprise birthday cookies before she was ready to present them. She couldn't tell you how he had made her a cookie conveyor belt in a bid for forgiveness. The King didn't bake, as far as she knew.

She couldn't tell you how he would make up rhymes out of the periodic table of elements. The little hints she came up with in chemistry class weren't part of her subconscious. If anything, it was Naminé remembering something from one of the Nobodies. Probably that jerk with the scar and eye patch, claiming to be a scientist.

No, Kairi couldn't tell you about how she had heard the Ansem the Wise laugh a thousand times because he had never laughed in those minutes when their paths crossed.

Because the "anything can happen" the man promised stopped at Riku's transformation. The fragments of light scattered in the air didn't flake away anything inside her, didn't start unearthing old memories.

Kairi was a princess only in name. Nothing more.

* * *

**AN. **Based on the theory that Kairi is Ansem's daughter. 8) Title means "I know that I know nothing" in Latin.


	18. Who?

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Roxas Prologue  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_076 - Who?

* * *

**Lens Flare**

**1 ~** Roxas first sees her while drinking slushies with Hayner, Pence and Olette in Tram Common.

She is a blonde. Jean Capri pants, white halter. She's on a bike, the orange summer sun glinting harshly against the blue frame. It's like a lens flare from across the pavement.

She rides in sandals with no hands on the handlebars. She ties her hair back with a ribbon, then swerves to get her balance back as her hands go back to the handles.

Then Hayner mentions the chem lab due next Friday and Roxas joins him in griping.

**2 ~** She has a basket in-between her handlebars. She carries a sketchpad and pencils and who knows what other art supplies in it. He saw her again while he was walking up a hill and she was biking down. She had smiled at him.

He wondered where he had seen her before.

**3 ~ **Not at school, that was for sure. No one had heard of a girl whose blonde ponytail always rested over her right shoulder, even though he had spent his entire lunch period asking around. Pence had wondered how Roxas could've picked up on something like that. Olette had replied that he must've been paying attention for once.

He was paying attention, now more than ever. Nobody at school knew her? Where did she live? Maybe she was homeschooled, but that didn't give her a reason to be biking around alone. Was she lonely?

What was her _name?_

**4 ~ **He's skateboarding when he sees her next. He slips in beside her and he notices that she's on an oddly high gear for level ground. She explains, "I need my exercise."

"What, do they only let you out of the house to spin in the hamster wheel before locking you up again?"

She gives him one of those girl _looks._

He laughs nervously and points. "Bees!"

Her breaks screech and Roxas rolls past her, laughing.

Then he hears the sound of bicycle tires tearing over pavement. He pushes off the pavement frantically and heads toward the closest downhill incline. He needs to get away from whatever weapons she has stored in the basket and quickly.

**5 ~ **She catches up to him quickly and stays on his tail, forcing him into the woods. They both hit the roots and trip off their skateboard and bicycle. They stumble across the dewy grass, but manage to stay standing. They're both very good at this, apparently.

They look at each other across a distance measured in slants of sunlight. He leans his hands on his knees, grinning up at her as they both catch their breath.

"Is this the part where you tell me your name?" he asked.

She's strung two lengths of ribbon through the belt loops on her Capri pants: one white, one black. Bows and streamers on either hip. A pale blue one in her hair, like her sandals. She likes ribbon, apparently. That would come in handy later, he was sure.

"We've only just met," she said. "I actually wasn't expecting to catch you."

"Hmm," he said, standing up straight. "Maybe I let you catch me."

"Why would you do that?"

"Because I want to meet you," he says. Wasn't it obvious?

"When did you decide that?"

He folds his arms. "When I realized that nobody knew who you were. Don't you have any friends?"

She opens her mouth and closes it again. She folds her hands and looks down at them.

"I'm Roxas," he says.

She smiles, looking at him from underneath her lashes. Her cheeks pink in the golden-green shadows. "My name is Naminé."

* * *

**AN. **Takes place in a Twilight Town AU! Roxas and Naminé have always lived in Twilight Town. If I continue I'll explain in further depth.


	19. Too Much

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Roxas Prologue.  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_033 - Too Much

* * *

**Uncertainty**

Roxas knew that his room was about fourteen strides from the foot of his bed to the wall and back. He didn't know this because he was pacing. He knew it because…

He _was _pacing.

Damn it. He hated pacing. You got nothing accomplished by it; all you did was literally go nowhere. Just back and forth on one set path. But no matter how hard he tried, sighing down at his boots and his cloak trailed him on another turn, he couldn't think of anything else he could do.

He _could_ take out Oathkeeper and Oblivion and smash something, but he was waiting here. And he kind of liked the things he kept in his room. Besides, Naminé, not to mention the rest of the Organization, would probably get all worked up if he desecrated his own quarters.

A chill worked down his arm as a portal opened in the far corner. He turned, and Naminé stepped out of the purple black. Her hands were folded neatly in front of her, fingers laced together. He liked it better when he made her hands crumple in frustration.

"Hi," she said.

He wished he knew how to discern some hidden meaning in that one sound. He got impatient when he couldn't. "Hey."

She frowned at the floor, biting her lips and stopping herself. "I talked to Luxord."

He nodded. She had told him before where she would be before coming to see him. "I know. How is he?"

"He's… Luxord," she said. She meandered to one of his white couches and sat, away from mud stains Axel's boots had left on the far arm rest.

"I hope so," Roxas said, sticking his hands in his pockets. He sat next to her, watching their reflections in the screen of the nearby television. "Otherwise we'd have an imposter on our hands."

She laughed gently. His lips twitched, but the reprieve didn't last long, because they caught each other's eyes again. She looked towards her bare toes. "He's worried about me."

"I don't blame him. Marluxia hasn't exactly had a good track record with you. I know if Xemnas really knew what happened then he wouldn't still be charge of that stupid place."

"Roxas. I'll be fine. I won't let Marluxia…" She drifted off, biting at her bottom lip again. "He won't… touch me ever again." She nodded, mostly to herself, confirming. "I'll be fine. I'll stay strong, I promise. For you. For Luxord. For Demyx, and Xigbar and Xaldin and maybe even Saïx. I mean – who are you guys going to come to when you need to say something crazy?"

She shivered, wiping at her eyes. "Oh, geeze." She waited for him to start teasing her, for him to tell her she was a baby.

Instead, he kissed her, clumsy with anger. "You're terrified," he said against her lips. If they had hearts, they'd be fluttering birds. "You're just as scared as I am."

"Roxas, I—" He tried again, pressing her into the corner of the couch and kissing her longer, deeper. Her breath shook. He was right. She _was_ terrified. The little walls she had put up had been made of rotten wood in the first place.

"You're terrified because, because you're going to be gone tomorrow and Luxord or – I don't know – everyone else can't look out for you. And I can't be there either. And… I won't be able to…" He kissed her again, slowly.

"I won't be able to…"

_Kiss; kiss me _something in both their heads screamed.

Roxas held back against it with difficulty. "I won't be able to see you kicking ass for myself, you know? And you have to come back so I can see you." _And kiss you, eidolons I should've done that sooner. Damn it, _stay.

"Roxas." Her lips felt all tingly, and she didn't know what to do to make everything _stop _the way it was. "Roxas."

And Naminé wakes up.

She wakes up in the middle of his name on her tingling lips: "R…"

The Replica is suddenly with her, or maybe he'd always been there. "Replica," she scrambles to say. And then she sits up in her little bed, upset. "Sorry, I shouldn't have called—"

"I don't mind, Naminé. You were having a nightmare," he said. His gloved fingers brushed a strand of hair back into place.

Her breath shuddered again. "I'm not terrified."

He smiled. "I hope not. I'm here to protect you."

Roxas had been wrong, she thought, moving into the cold armour-skin of the Replica's touch. He... She did have someone to protect her.

But, she thought, hiding her frown from the Replica against her shoulder, was that what she wanted?

* * *

**AN. **Companion to "Not Enough".


	20. Lovers

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHI - Hollow Bastion (?)  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_023 - Lovers

* * *

**The Best-Laid Plans**

"_You are a fool, Mouse King."_

Maleficent's cloak was everywhere; it was up and down and all around forever. It was the darkness itself. He was breathing it and it bled out of her, _into_ her. Her eyes were dying red neon now. _"You are attempting to stop something you cannot possibly confront on your own. Just as your friend Ansem did before you."_

She glided forward. Anxiety and nightmares sloshed over bright yellow shoes and started creeping upwards.

Her laugh was hollow and short. _"You are correct, in that your heart is protected by your Keyblade's link to the Realm of Darkness. You_ can _face me here."_ If her face could still be considered human, the Witch smiled. _"But you should've thought of that before you injured yourself in that siege. Oh, but that was my doing as well, wasn't it?"_

Mickey tried to raise his arms, but his strength was being sapped of whatever exhaustion was still left in them. Her claw-fingers were around his windpipe suddenly, and the only thing he could think was that he was sorry he didn't say goodbye. They had all said there was no need. He hoped that wherever Ansem was now, as the blackness behind his eyelids grew warmer and more welcoming, that he didn't regret anything.

There was a breath of cold, and a snap. Maleficent positively _screeched_ and tossed him across the room-realm-reality.

He opened his eyes, and spotted the area where his rescuer had broken through, light cracking through the floor like an upside down skylight. Sora and Riku had said that the Beast had once torn through dimensions through sheer force of will, and he laughed at himself to think _she_ couldn't. That she wouldn't come in, busting him out of trouble yet again.

Minnie Mouse, his burning blur of pink everything, had shot Maleficent in the face with a Blizzard arrow. She pulled back her magic bow again, and he recognized the silver glow of a Holy arrow forming.

He started to fade out as her light spread, taking over Maleficent's temporary world, but he heard her voice clear as wedding bells on a spring morning.

"Do not. Touch. My husband."


	21. When?

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Unknown Organization Members?  
_**Warnings: **_None.  
_**Prompt: **_079 - Years

* * *

**The Prisons We Choose**

In the Castle White, there are twelve rooms, twelve chambers where the Major Arcana of twelve mighty cards reside. And all of them are connected via secret passageways that no one quite understands.

The first six of the cards have so many passageways that the walls between their chambers are hollow. The Moon follows a long straight corridor to the Emperor, no complications or swerves. The Sitarist's passageways curve around the Opposite's chambers, frustrating but ultimately close in a spiral staircase. The passageways of the Scythe, the High Priestess, and the Teardrops (the young Flush calls him Diamond-Eyes) weave through each other, traps and doors laid. Theirs is a lover's tango, doomed to collapse one day.

And the Master is left alone.

His chamber is filled with doors and opportunities, surrounding him like a clock face. How the Master loves his games. His fellow gamblers watch as he opens one door and leaves the rest closed. The single rectangle of light cuts the circle room in two. They watch from the corners. They wait.

The Opposite strides in on occasion, never using the front door. He speaks crassly, so unlike the tone of the Master. He isn't welcome, because he doesn't use the front door and that's not part of the rules. But all the same, he enters, and he understands some things about the Master. He knows about his strange dreams and his need for a sense of 'fun and games'. But he is gone soon after, to look for the others he is connected to.

Some of the other Lords (or the Lady) stray close to his Game, the mystery he sees in himself. They stand in the doorway, never wanting to learn the rules. They already have their own passageways – why bother complicating things and opening more doors?

And the Master does wonder. Why bother? He waits in the darkness, and they watch as his chamber becomes a dungeon around him. He could leave. _Leave Master. Spark conversation._ But he tells them that he is fine on his own, in the long words they understand too well.

But hark! One day, Royal and Full have news. New Greaters. _Light and Memories._ All of the Lessers are gossiping amongst themselves, speaking in the deeper language the Lords don't understand. Two new sets of siblings! Light. Memories! Together? Hope for us after all? Hope. Hope?

They are confused when they are only greeted with one new set of little brothers. The Samurai are quiet, but aggressive, like the Prince of Light in his black armour and twin Keyblades. Only the Creepers speak of his counterpart, saying the Princess is quiet and kind, and that the Greaters are meeting her one by one.

They watch the Master. He does not have hope.

On the day he meets with the Princess, the back door opens, and they watch. It had always been locked, and they see a passageway behind. The Master goes into it. When he returns, he has met the Princess, and invited her to play the game. But no true hope lies in his eyes.

At first, he treats her no different than the other players: sees her only a piece to play with, to manipulate for brief amusement and then let her pass by like grains of sand in a glass.

But it is Royal who speaks up. _No, Master,_ he says, _she is your Opponent. She is your Apprentice, the one who will play the Game. She is the Princess and she will listen to you._

_We have been watching, Master. You have been waiting for a friend. We have been waiting. She is she._

The Master is silent for a long time, then orders them to leave him.

Alone in his castle study, the Master contemplates the door that had been locked for so long. Slowly, he climbs the secret staircase to the tower room, stained blue with moonlight. The Princess waits, sitting on her white dress folds. She wears no crown, but she smiles at him from across a battle map of fifty-two spread cards.

"Can you teach me?" she asks, a little shyly.

He smiles. "Indeed. I can."


	22. Shade

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ KHII - Second Visit to Land of Dragons/Xigbar?  
_**Warnings: **_PG-13, for mentions of a violent death?  
_**Prompt: **_075 - Shade

* * *

**Glass Houses**

"You aren't seeing things."

He shook his head lightly and grinned. "You're going to have to prove it."

The woman smiled and looked out onto the pool beyond the glass walls. She looked like a dream standing there, sunlight refracting off _white _hair. Green eyes, dark skin, pink lips, stick frame. The only thing that grounded her to reality was the heavy grey sweater she wore over a casual sundress.

"You must be here to see Edna," she continued as though not hearing him.

"E? Yeah. We need a uniform in size shrimp for our newest member." He shoved his hands into his jeans and leaned his shoulder against the pane of glass. The sunlight warmed his leather jacket and t-shirt underneath.

"No more Organization XII?"

"Thirteen of us now." His grin stretched. "Familiar with my work?"

"I've read your file. Only villains Edna Mode has ever dealt with."

"Oh dear. I think you've got the wrong impression. We're not all bad."

She looked at him out of the corner of her eye, a silent consent to continue.

"There was this one time, in Kauai. I was tracking this alien. Turns out he was best friends with this little surfer girl. She was what, five? She went up on this killer wave and I saw this Heart- this shark coming out of the water at her. Shot it in the head. She deserved that wave." He laughed. "Guess that's nothing next to you hero types."

Now _she _laughed, quiet and derisive. "And you thought I had the wrong impression?" She turned away from the window view, smiled. But something in that smile had teeth. Sharp ones. It stopped the man's breath short.

She paused, looking at him from beneath a white sweep of hair, then continued. "Once upon a time, a little girl's mother didn't want anything to do with her bosses disgusting advances. So he shot the little girl's mother."

Her heels click-click-clicked on her way to him and he was reminded horribly of the sound of no bullets, the desperation and panic he could feel once. He gulped, Adam's apple bobbing.

"One day, the girl grew up and found the man. And during their little chat the man became so overcome with guilt, the girl suggested he end all that pain. He did." Her eyes were startlingly green this close, glinting in the sunlight. They were the green of an oasis in the middle of a desert: everything he could ever want, anything he could ever believe, gone in an instant.

"Bang," she said, and the power in her eyes was gone. Her smile curved wide as he shivered; rolling his shoulders back as though in preparation.

"Ooh, I like _you,_" he said. He offered a hand to shake. She took it.

"Xigbar."

"Mirage."


	23. Water

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ ...None?  
_**Warnings: **_PG-13, for violence/blood.  
_**Prompt: **_051 - Water

* * *

**Things Keep Happening**

It wasn't supposed to happen like this.

He had practiced trying to explain to her that what she had heard wasn't true. He was _real, _he had a _heart _just the same way she did. Instead she only threw a shuriken at his face, told him to just shut up and leave her alone. But her own (cute) face flinched and he could see that things were – maybe, possibly? – changing.

If he could just _touch _her, she'd see. He had to keep his sitar with him as a shield against her ninja… weapons, but he wouldn't dream of hurting her. Not when she made his little feeling-memories rustle and twinkle underneath his skin. Not when the thought of her made notes appear on a staff – always five-fifths time, always so quick and gustoso. Not when-

The air of the blue night cuts and curls back. There is a ninja-star-thing in his sitar's neck, and then everything shuts down.

His fingers shake and he _plays, _the notes coming out all wrong without a string. The weapon is part of a Nobody's _soul, _summoned from within and now she's gone and broken it.

The air is alive with fountain water (when was there a fountain?), curling back and cutting and falling apart without the _damn _string. He puts his weight in his back leg (or something, he can't remember) and swings the sitar and it collides. Yuffie Kisaragi cries in the night.

Everything stops. Demyx stops.

Yuffie's nose is bleeding. The right side of her face is starting to purple and swell. She spits on his boot and it's red.

"…I'm sorry," he says, feeling the hole in his chest rip at the edges. "I'm so-"

"Stay the hell away from me, _Nobody!_" Her shuriken glows green and spins around her, energy lengthening the metal reach. It catches him across the shoulder and on his calf.

He backs away and is gone from the abandoned square so quickly his head spins with the glare of starlight.

Later, he knocks on Xigbar's door. His teacher from the early days of Organization IX is glad to see scratches on him, proud of the blood on his boot. He gives him medicine and an ice pack for his aching mind.

"Xigbar, am I a bad person?"

"Sorry, kid." The hand lays heavy on his shoulder. "You're not a person at all."


	24. Parents

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Kingdom Hearts_ or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.

_**Spoilers:**_ ...None?  
_**Warnings: **_G!  
_**Prompt: **_027 - Parents

* * *

**Can We Keep Him?**

Xigbar knew that Demyx was sane, no matter how many times he tried to make his memories of emotions real. So when he strolled past the Nocturne's room one day and heard the kid talking to himself, he opened the door so fast it slammed against the frame, crossed his arms over his chest and demanded to know: "What is going on in here, young man?"

Demyx froze on the floor in front of his bed, twanging his sitar's strings lightly. "Nothing," he said, trying not to sound nervous.

Xigbar tensed when a stranger's voice spoke. "I have never smelled _you_ before."

He looked down. A golden retriever was sniffing at the hem of his cloak. "You smell strange, so I will remember you," it said, a red light blinking on the oddly familiar, bulky collar.

"DEMYX," Xigbar said.

"Uh," Demyx replied.

"This is that dog from Paradise Falls, isn't it?"

"No!"

"I live in Paradise Falls," the dog said. Xigbar looked again and the dog was lying on his back, paws in the air, panting. "May you scratch my belly? I _like_ to have my belly scratched."

"Demyx, are you lying to me?"

"He followed me home! Honest!"

"The only way he could've gotten here is by Gummi ship! I told you Xemnas wouldn't let us keep pets but you took this dog-"

"Dug," Demyx corrected.

"-Dug off his World anyway. And now you're lying to your elder!" He approached the neophyte, pointing threateningly. "You are in deep trouble, little dude."

'Dug' nudged his snout under Xigbar's other glove, hanging at his side. "I love you."

Xigbar's face faltered. Demyx raised his eyebrows.

Silence. The _one_ time Xigbar decides he's actually going to be authoritative with his recruit and he has to deal with unconditional love. Then-

"Xigbar, want to move him to your room?"

"No!"

"I think you'd like him."

"I would not!"

"Now _you're_ lying!"

"I would like food now," Dug said, smiling blankly.


End file.
